


toss me

by rainbowshoes



Series: witcher tumblr prompts [1]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: First Meetings, M/M, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:15:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27500638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainbowshoes/pseuds/rainbowshoes
Summary: i asked for prompts and this is the answer to this one:"Honestly, I would like to read how you imagined their first meeting. I bet Eskel got a bit overwhelmed lol"
Relationships: Eskel/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: witcher tumblr prompts [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2004985
Comments: 11
Kudos: 171





	toss me

**Author's Note:**

> title from [this vine](https://youtu.be/sRh2zszcDUI) (really the full title should be "toss me my keys" and i was gonna do a pun on that but i didnt and youre welcome)
> 
> as ive said before i shamelessly exploit game content for my own purposes - and that includes the use of potions (and how they work)

"Hey!" 

Eskel ignored the hissed whisper. He didn't really want any trouble, not at this time of night in this part of Redania. He knew better. He kept his eyes on the notice board. 

"Hey!" The hissed whisper was more insistent. "Witcher!" 

Eskel sighed, his shoulders slumping. He finally turned his head in the direction of the whisper and peered into the darkness. There was… nothing there. He frowned, slightly. 

"Up here," the whisper called. Eskel looked up toward the buildings, and sure enough, there was a man clinging to the bottom edge of a window, the toes of his boots precariously perched on the top ledge of the window below. The building was a tall one, and the man was up rather high. And, Eskel realized, while his shirt was a fairly normal white linen, the trousers were strikingly brilliant blue silk. The man grinned at him. "Hello, yes, would you mind? I'm a bit… stuck. Doesn't happen often. I'm _very_ good at getting out of windows, but." He sort of shrugged.

Eskel walked a little closer, a small smile starting to curl at one side of his mouth - the unscarred side. "Let's see. Bright colored silk, climbing out of windows, friendly to witchers. I don't see a lute, though." 

The man grinned even wider at him. "You know Geralt? Geralt told you about me?" Then he scoffed. "I'm sure he's only said the worst sort of slander." He stuck out his tongue in a surprisingly childish pout. "If I fling myself off this ledge, will you catch me? I'll make it up to you!"

The man - Jaskier, it had to be Jaskier, Eskel didn't know of anyone else who would be so mad - didn't wait for a response. He jumped, quite literally flinging himself from the side of the building. Eskel had to scramble to get close enough to catch him so he didn't hit the ground, and even when Jaskier landed in his arms and against his chest in a tangle of limbs, the impact was jarring and painful enough to force all the breath from Jaskier's lungs and make him groan softly. 

And yet, once he managed to get a breath, he grinned at Eskel, and then he laughed. Baffled, Eskel couldn't quite stop the small smile at the corner of his lips. 

The window from which Jaskier had been hanging opened and a woman leaned out of it. "You bastard!" she screeched. 

Jaskier yelped and scrambled down from Eskel's arms. "Let's go, let's go!" Without a second of hesitation, Jaskier grabbed Eskel's hand and tugged him along through darkened streets. The woman was still yelling and shouting after them, but no one was following. Jaskier realized it at the same time Eskel was about to say something, and he came to a stop and collapsed against the side of a shop of some sort, laughing breathlessly and clutching his sides. 

"What sort of trouble have you gotten yourself into?" Eskel asked, still smiling for some reason he couldn't name. 

Jaskier had to reach up and wipe tears from his cheeks. "Apparently I was bedding her husband." Jaskier was still laughing, each word said with a giggle. "Not like he told  _ me  _ he was married." He bent double, clutching his middle. "You don't  _ understand _ ! This is almost exactly the same way I met Geralt. He saved me from some girl's brothers who had threatened to cover me in pitch and feathers."

Eskel shook his head and huffed a laugh. "How do you manage to get yourself in so much trouble?" He clapped Jaskier on the shoulder. "Come on, you can repay me by buying me a few drinks." 

"Gladly," Jaskier said, getting his laughter under control. He bumped his shoulder into Eskel's as if they hadn't only just met and had been friends for years. "Geralt mentioned once that he had brothers, but he never told me their names." 

"I'm Eskel," he said, shaking his head at Jaskier's confidence and gall. He couldn't quite hide his smile, and turned his head to the side a little to keep the scars away from Jaskier. 

Jaskier led them swiftly and surely toward a different part of the town. Eskel followed. He'd stabled Scorpion in this direction anyhow, though he hadn't yet found himself a room for the night. He'd mostly just wanted to give Scorpion a break for a while and see what he could find by way of a job. The notice board hadn't looked terribly promising, though. 

"Well, I'll have to correct any assumptions you've got about me based on whatever Geralt's told you." Jaskier was so damnably cheerful. Even after all that - throwing himself out a window and into a strange witcher's arms and running from an angry wife. "And I do owe you quite a few drinks for making sure I didn't break anything trying to get down from that window ledge." He boldly wrapped his arm around Eskel's and offered him a bright smile. "I've got a room at this inn down here and it has a decent tavern below it. I already sang for my supper, and they'll welcome me back easily enough. If you don't have a room for the night, you're more than welcome to share mine."

Absolutely baffling. Jaskier was mad. Or stupid. 

And yet Eskel didn't argue. He let Jaskier tug him down the street and inside a tavern. Probably because Jaskier was so at ease clinging to his arm, no one reacted any sort of way when they saw him. Most people glanced at him and quickly away when they saw the scar on his face, but that was normal enough. Jaskier guided him toward an empty table near the back and patted his shoulder before practically bouncing his way over to request - something. Ale, hopefully. 

The amusing part was that other patrons at the tavern noticed Jaskier's state of dress - or undress - and made teasing comments here and there. Jaskier tossed some right back to them, even as he steadily made his way back to Eskel with a pitcher in one hand and two very full tankards in the other. He was still laughing as he sat down, and Eskel couldn't quite stop his smile from tugging up one corner of his mouth. 

"Drinks, as promised," Jaskier announced, sliding one tankard toward Eskel and setting the pitcher between them. He drank down some of his own and gasped a little for breath. "Haven't had such an eventful night in quite a while." He laughed, somehow delighted despite having to throw himself out a window. 

Eskel lifted his tankard in a toast and took a drink. "Somehow, I find that hard to believe. You seem like the sort to find trouble wherever you go."

"I resent that," Jaskier said with a laugh. "Trouble finds  _ me _ , I don't go looking for it." He winked, bafflingly. "And I just so happened to have a delightfully helpful and handsome witcher to assist me this time." 

"I'll bet you say that a lot," Eskel said dryly. 

Jaskier placed his hand over his heart. "My dear witcher. I would never. Besides, most of the time, I can get myself out of trouble as easily as I stumble into it. Like I said, I'm very good at climbing out of - and into - windows." He grinned salaciously. "Anyhow, Geralt hasn't told me anything at all about any of his witcher brothers. And I know now he's said at least something about me. So." Jaskier raised his eyebrows. "Clearly you two are similar in your willingness to help save poor bards in distress. You certainly don't seem like the type to sit in corners and  _ brood _ , though. I can't help but wonder where else the similarities begin and end."

Eskel did laugh at that. "No, not so much." He rubbed at the scarred side of his face, a little embarrassed. "Geralt is certainly more the brooding type of us. And Lambert would have laughed at you and walked away, probably. He can be a bit of an ass."

"That tells me very little about  _ you _ , though," Jaskier said with a pointed drink. 

"What do you want to know?" Eskel asked with a helpless shrug. "I'm a witcher, same as Geralt. It's not terribly interesting."

Jaskier made an offended noise. "I can't believe you don't think you're interesting. Fine. I'll have to chatter your ear off until you manage to shake me off and then you'll see." It sounded like a threat. Somehow, that didn't seem like a bad thing. It even made Eskel laugh. "Tell me how long you've known Geralt and we'll go from there until you tell me every last detail of your most recent hunt. I'll need  _ all  _ the details to write a proper song. Geralt is always stingy on the details and then complains when I get something wrong." 

"I've known Geralt since we were boys," Eskel began. 

And the questions didn't stop until very, very late that night - and Jaskier continued to ask them all the next day, and the next, even as he simply packed up his things and set off alongside Eskel and Scorpion. It was surprisingly nice, having someone to talk to. Eskel didn't get much in the way of conversation except for during the winter. He hadn't said so much at once in months. 

Jaskier got a real kick out of the story about the succubus and swore heartily to turn it into a song. 

Eskel hadn't quite believed Jaskier when he'd said he didn't go looking for trouble and that it often found him instead. But that truly seemed to be the case. They were on a road between towns near Ghelibol when a fucking [cemetaur](https://witcher.fandom.com/wiki/Cemetaur) of all things tried attacking him.

Jaskier had been walking several paces behind Eskel, fiddling with his lute and occasionally asking questions. He'd been working on the succubus song he'd promised to write, trying lines, scrapping them, and trying different ones. Eskel had been thoroughly amused by the process, sometimes laughing outright at Jaskier's frustrations and curses and demands for Eskel to repeat parts of the tale. 

And then the cemetaur had run up on Jaksier and knocked him flat all the space of a few seconds. Eskel had felt the vibrations in his medallion and had turned to warn Jaskier with exactly enough time to watch the cemetaur plow into him. Eskel didn't think, didn't pause. He threw out a quen shield to protect Jaskier and shot off a blast of igni to drive back the cemetaur to distract it and get its attention. 

He hated cemetaurs. They were a bitch and a half to deal with. Luckily, this one seemed to be on its own - no graviers following it around. He snatched up one of his Black Blood potions and downed it with a foul grimace and then yanked his silver sword free and leapt at it, drawing it away from Jaskier. He had to get it far enough away before he could do much sign work so he didn't unintentionally harm Jaskier in the process. 

Scorpion had already moved away, and Eskel was able to lead the cemetaur further down the street with taunting blows and by letting it get in one single bite to his arm. It hurt horribly, but the Black Blood was clearly having an effect on it. A quick yrden to trap it and a few swift blows later and the cemetaur screamed its death throes. 

Eskel spat at it, hating the taste of the Black Blood and hating the cemetaur itself. He turned and looked for Jaskier to make sure he was all right. His medallion was no longer humming warnings at him, so he didn't expect more necrophages, but that didn't mean he was going to let down his guard. 

Jaskier was digging in Scorpion's saddle bags - and Eskel was a little surprised his horse even allowed such a thing. Then again, somehow Jaskier had managed to befriend  _ Roach _ , and she was as liable to bite Geralt as she was to deign to let him ride her. Eskel was even more surprised when Jaskier came jogging over to him with vials of White Honey and Swallow. 

"Here," Jaskier said, holding them out. "That bite looks very nasty, and we definitely need to find a place to get that cleaned up." He wiggled the White Honey in the air. "Come on, then." 

Eskel took it, a little baffled. "How -"

"I've traveled with Geralt for  _ years _ , do you really think I haven't figured out most of these potions and how to stitch up a few wounds by now? Be reasonable." He scoffed, but he was very insistent about Eskel taking the White Honey from him, even going so far as to break the wax seal and pull free the cork. He turned and whistled, high and sharp - not quite like Eskel and Geralt called their horses, but close enough - and Scorpion came trotting closer. When he turned back, he nodded, pleased that Eskel had drank the White Honey. He pushed the Swallow into Eskel's hand and then went rooting through his saddle bags - again - for a cloth before stealing Eskel's sword from his fingers and cleaning the blade well enough to put away for the time being. Eskel was a little too baffled by the whole situation to stop him. 

"There should be a little stream not far from here. We'll head there for a bit and get your arm cleaned up and bandaged - can't really stitch bite wounds - and then we'll keep moving. I don't know what sort of necrophage  _ that  _ was, but I don't fancy sticking around to see if more happen to pop up." Jaskier took Scorpion's reins and began to lead him away, and Eskel - 

Eskel walked along beside him, keeping Jaskier between himself and Scorpion. "It was a cemetaur. If more come, get on Scorpion and get away from here. I can't fight them well if I'm worried about you, too."

Jaskier nodded. "I - thank you. For that." He waved behind himself, then paused and looked back at the cemetaur corpse. "Did you need anything from it?"

"No," Eskel said with a grimace. "Couldn't get anything from it, and I didn't have a contract to kill it, anyway." He nudged Jaskier to keep him walking. "I hate those things. Worse than graviers." Jaskier made a face, and Eskel nodded. "I have no idea how that thing found you out here in the middle of nowhere like that." 

"There is a very good reason I don't travel alone," Jaskier said. "Shit like that seems to follow me endlessly." He sighed and shrugged. "Still, at least I had you around to save me again." He smiled brightly. 

Eskel huffed a laugh. "Well I wasn't going to let it eat you before I'd gotten my song." Jaskier laughed, his head tipped back to the sky, and Eskel smiled. "If we make good time, we can sleep in real beds tonight."

"Well, then, let's get moving," Jaskier said, sounding pleased. "But we are absolutely taking care of your arm first." 

**Author's Note:**

> here's [my tumblr](https://shyglittercreature.tumblr.com/) come say hey or send more prompts


End file.
